Memories From the Islands - Market

The Fruit and Vegetable Market in Busby Alley, Bridgetown, 1955

"The market we had twice a week. The traders - 'higglers' we called them - would come to the country on Wednesday and buy the food from the local people and take it back to sell to the town folk at a more expensive price on Saturday."

"You had to learn to bargain with the traders, you'd look at the fish to see how fresh it is, and if you lift the head up and look at the gills and it doesn't look too red, you'd say - 'oh this fish doesn't look too fresh, I want fresh fish'."

"Before buses were really in abundance in Dominica, people would travel on the truck or they would have to walk from midnight until 5 o'clock in the morning to get to the market. All the members of the family would do their thing in the week, making hats, cocoa, cinnamon, brooms, and they would set off from Grand Bay to sell them at the market. That was their weekly money to feed the family."

Fruit and Vegetable Market Catalogue Reference: () INF10/39/016

"Going to market, you'd have a pudding pan full of stuff, tied up with a cloth and you'd carry it on your head. They call it a 'bundle'. If your parents are going to the market, its something that you would do with them and carry your share - however small, they made the bundle according to your size to carry." "There's an art in making baskets. My grandfather used to make these. You get 10 or 12 strips of bamboo or screw pine and lay them across, start in the centre and weave them under and over until it reaches a certain size. These memories came out of a project involving Haringey Third Age, Moving Here, The National Archives and Bruce Castle Museum Haringey.